Equal pay for men & women cricketers

In news– In a landmark move, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) announced that it will be implementing a new pay equity policy for its contracted women cricketers, effectively paying men and women cricketers the same match fees.

Key updates-

The Honorary Secretary of BCCI said that women cricketers will be paid the same match fee as the men: Test matches at Rs 15 lakhs, ODI matches at Rs 6 lakhs and T20I at Rs 3 lakhs.
Until now, Indian women’s cricketers earned Rs 4 lakhs for test matches, and Rs 1 lakh for T20s and ODIs.
In cricket, apart from the match-wise fees, there is a retainership payment system.
For women cricketers, Rs 50 lakh for Grade A cricketers, Rs 30 lakh for Grade B and Rs 10 lakh for Grade C cricketers are paid annually apart from the match fees.
Men cricketers, who play a higher number of games, are paid between Rs 7 crore and Rs 1 crore depending on their grade, starting with an A Plus grade. There will be no change in this, as of now.
There will also be equity on matters such as travel, accommodation, and the wider playing and training environment. The men’s team also continues to have higher retainers than the women.

Other countries to bring pay parity in sports-

The first country to do so was New Zealand in July 2022.
New Zealand Cricket, the governing body for professional cricket in the country, and the players’ association signed a five-year deal so that both international and domestic level-women players will receive the same match fees as men across all formats and competitions.
Australia has also recently begun ambitious plans to popularise cricket in the country in 2022, with a focus on bringing women’s cricket on par with men’s cricket.
Cricket Australia, the governing body for professional and amatuer cricket in the country, aims to double the number of boys playing the game in the age group of 5-12 years to 2,10,000 and quadruple the number of girls in the same age bracket to 60,000.
It has also increased women’s pay significantly in the last few years.
Similarly, the Committee of Administrators that runs the affairs of the Table Tennis Federation of India, said in May 2022 that it would offer equal prize money for men and women in all the national zonal tournaments – including national championships across age groups.
In another significant step, the US Soccer Associations for men and women negotiated agreements for equal pay this year as well.